By the Deep
by kikis2
Summary: Pre-series. Serena's disappeared to parts unknown and Chuck's never been one to pass up a challenge. But can he handle what he finds? Hints of N/B C/S.


**A/N: 'Cause Serena was so cute when she was trying to find Chuck. Sorry for any mistakes, I'm kind of drowsy. **

**Warning: Language, adult themes. And I have no idea where Connecticut…or New York is, but in this world you can totally get there in a day.**

It was another late night full of girls and scotch and mild disappointment. He doesn't know why he bothered to turn up. St Jude's has never held any appeal. Constance is dull. Queen B rules and so does responsible drinking and shirts buttoned up to the chin

On the west field, Nate's lacrosse team has an early practice and Blair is struggling to pay attention. Kati and Iz sit below chattering incessantly, not even feigning interest in the game. Chuck makes his way along the bleachers to sit one step above Blair—he knows how much that annoys her.

Blair speaks without turning around. "Little early for you. Isn't there some gutter you should be rolling around in?" She smiles prettily.

"It doesn't miss me the way you do," he smarms, chucking her under the chin.

Blair avoids his touch. "What do you want, Chuck? Or is the sight of sweaty males rubbing against each other too alluring for you to resist?"

Chuck finds Nate almost instantly. He's shoving a shoulder into some guy then crying out his openness.

"The homoerotic undertones are rather…captivating," he answers in disparagement, "but no, I actually came to see you." Blair frowns in disbelief before he continues. "You see the blast this morning?" His maleness shudders slightly after he admits to reading Gossip Girl.

"No," Blair snaps, before Iz cuts her off. "I heard she's in Mexico, dating some mafia guy," the petite girl snarks delightedly.

Blair's head whips around terrifyingly fast. "No one asked you, Iz," she hisses in a voice becoming increasingly loud and high pitched. "So the next time you have an opinion, I'd thank you to purge it from your head, because _thinking_ isn't what you do so well."

Iz and Kati share some silent message, before smirking and turning away in sync.

They must have missed a whistle, because Nate's there, grinning when Blair ducks away from his sweaty touch.

"'S up, man?" Nate asks, focused on the lacrosse stick swinging back and forth in his hands.

"We're solving the mystery of our missing queen." He threw that bit in just to watch the fear in Blair's eyes. She'd taken the kingdom, but it still didn't feel like hers.

Nate looks up, eyes wide in alarm. His lacrosse stick goes slack in his hands, completely forgotten. He glances at Blair then back again. "Why? I mean, did—" He presses his lips together, as if to stop anything else from pouring out. "What have you heard?"

Chuck feels like rolling his eyes. How does Blair not see it? The guilt makes Nate stupid—more stupid. "What do _you_ think? Is Serena shacked up with some drug lord down Mexico way?" he asks, but can't manage a smile. Nate has to know. He has to.

"I don't know. She hasn't spoken to any of us," Nate rushes on. He looks to Blair, either for guidance or to make sure she's not looking on in suspicion. But Blair's talking loud and wild, as if she can drone out any painful names of ex-best friends. Iz has learnt her lesson and is listening dutifully, but Kati looks on with sharp, curious eyes.

"I doubt she'd go that far just to run away," Nate informs him quietly. And then he grins, wipes Serena and his mistakes from his mind, before asking how Butter was last night.

Chuck notices that he's the only one who still uses her name.

The team head out for the last quarter, and Chuck wanders into the locker room. Nate's phone waits patiently in an open locker, with only one received call that doesn't have a name attached. Back outside, he dials it and convinces Caitlyn, who lives on the same floor as Serena, to give him Serena's new number. Serena's voicemail taunts him and Caitlyn sounds annoyed the second time around. Eventually she passes him onto someone who can help. A few long-winded threats later and some guy, Hayden or Heath, tells Chuck where he dropped Serena off this morning.

He orders his driver not to break for children and dozes off before they reach the city limits.

**xoxo**

If Sunken Meadow State Park is a beautiful place, you wouldn't know it on a day like this. It's two p.m. on an overcast Monday: the park is as deserted as it gets. The air is cold and damp. The salt air immediately makes him feel dirty.

The beach goes on for miles, but he spots Serena in the distance before his first step onto sand.

She's laying on her back, a thin summer dress plastered to her legs, the water lapping at her calves before receding. A pair of spindly heels lay abandoned by her side.

He stands over her head, waiting for her eyes to focus on him.

"Chucky," she finally greets him in a quietly pleased voice, a distant smile forming.

"Serena." Chuck's lips turn down in disappointment. He was looking forward to some huge, dramatic showdown of Queen S proportions. There should be screaming, and sarcasm, and a few moments of blind hatred before she giggles and asks him to stay.

"What are you doing?" He means to ask what she's doing running away, to _Connecticut_ no less.

She takes it literally. "Waiting."

"For what?"

"The water." She knows she's not making any sense. Her mind in blurry, thoughts jumping from point A to E and she gets lost somewhere in between.

"This would be the place to do it." A lone couple stroll along the boardwalk, shooting them an odd look.

"But you're here. Maybe I was waiting for that."

"Are you high?" he demands.

"I'm awake, aren't I?" she jokes with little humour.

Her tanned skin is thin and translucent with an almost grey tinge, the sapphire of her eyes swallowed whole by her pupils. Her hair's still brilliant and thick, but it only serves to make the rest of her look less substantial. He almost wishes he hadn't come. He knows the way Serena looks now will be scorched into his brain.

There's dark shapes dipping in and out of the waves slowly rolling closer, she watches them anxiously. Is oxy supposed to make you see things? She doesn't ask Chuck; she doesn't want to know.

Sitting up, she quickly pulls her legs from the water. Resting her head on her knees, she watches in amusement as Chuck contemplates the sand with distaste before pulling off his St Jude's jacket to sit on.

"What are you doing in this hell hole?" he growls.

Lies fall out of her mouth before a thought can enter her head. She knows her story well. "School. I was almost failing and—"

He raises an eyebrow and looks around the beach. "I can see how hard you're working."

"It's been a rough weekend," she replies slowly, not really looking at him.

"I bet," he smirks, peering at her ravaged looks.

"What are you doing here?"

"You know me and drives along the country side." What does she think he's doing here? "When are you coming back?"

Her eyes flee. "I don't know. The school breaks—"

"Enough about school! How did Lily fall for that one? You fucked Nate. So what? Come home. You obviously can't keep a secret, so man up, tell Blair and help her get over it."

_How did he know?_ "Did Nate send you?" She's half hoping, half dreading his response. Her shoulders slump, eyes focused everywhere but on Chuck. "It doesn't matter. It's gone now."

He almost asks her what's gone, but his brain catches up with his mouth just in time. He takes a sharp breath, peering at her face then her stomach. There's no sign. Should there be? He doesn't know.

Serena catches his look and her eyes shut tightly, a small horrified smile forming. "Nate didn't…?"

"Nate knew?" This can't be right. Sure Serena might be messy, but shouldn't Nate be here, riding to the rescue—cleaning things up? This isn't his place.

"Nate knew." The worst phone call of her life had been made two weeks ago. And Nate was silent for almost a whole minute before he choked out a broken _what are you going to do?_

She'd hung up.

She grabs Chuck's hand and he barely stops himself from flinching at her clammy touch. "Nate would have done the right thing." _Whatever that is_. "But I…I was just looking for someone to pass the responsibility on to." And she couldn't do that to Nate.

She doesn't ask him to keep quiet and she doesn't have to. Serena's the one person that doesn't always expect him to screw up, but accepts it easily when he does. He just unravels his scarf and lightly throws it around her neck. If anyone needs a little Chuck Bass magic, it's her.

She stretches out one leg to kick at the edge of the water. Her foot is numb, from the cold or pills she doesn't know, but the water feels like the rest of her—transparent, empty.

The cramps had stopped last night, but there were other things she didn't want to feel.

"Maybe I would have given birth to a water baby. Webbed toes and gills, scaly skin and a fin." Better to think of it that way. Just something conceived by the beach and too much blow. She didn't kill a part of Nate and herself. She didn't.

Chuck eyes her queerly. "It's cold. We should go. I'll take you back to your school." She shouldn't be here, with nothing but sheltered boarding school kids who would never understand her, but he doesn't think he can argue with her. Not now.

They don't talk about it, but she doesn't let go of his hand and he can't seem to make her. Her room is all wrong. There should be a million photos pasted around her mirror, bright accessories dropped carelessly on the floor. It's just a cramped, bland box—not a single thing to alert the world that this is where Serena van der Woodsen slept.

She sits on the edge of her bed, head down as if considering her teal-painted toenails. "Do you need to get home?"

He shrugs, poking through the texts on her desk. What does he have to go back to? A father that would be shocked to see him? A few strippers who would have to go without meth money? Blair and Nate holding hands, both doing their best to forget Serena exists, and hoping he doesn't come back.

Serena grabs a book from the floor. "So what do you know about the British Raj?" She bites her lip, trying to smile.

He stays for the night. They write two hundred words about salty water and Ghandi hitting his wife, before Chuck pulls out his wallet and hands her homework over to the first girl he sees.

They lay on her bed, not touching and not talking for the longest time.

"Did I do the right thing?"

He almost leaves right then. He shouldn't be having this conversation. He doesn't console, he doesn't help rationalize. He's never had the right words.

"Does it matter? You did it. It's done. The only thing left to do is live with it."

She can't face that yet. Can't think further than tonight. Her face hardens. "I don't miss it. New York, I mean. I don't want to go back."

"You will."

Serena rolls over and closes her eyes. He follows her till she has to snatch at her hair to stop him from lying on it. Slowly sleep takes over, even though the sun is still setting. She's not quite conscious, and won't remember the words in the morning, but he says them clear and sure.

"You did the right thing."

His hand sneaks around her waist when her breath evens out. He accidently brushes her lower stomach, before shuddering and moving his hand higher.

Chuck dreams of stupid, pretty babies that would blink big blue eyes and make boys lie for them too.

He leaves sometime before midnight. He touches her cheek, smoothes his plaid scarf out against her skin then sneaks out before she can wake up. If her eyes opened, he'd end up stuck in Connecticut for as long as she wanted him.

Her bed is empty in the morning, but her head feels clearer. She doesn't need to swallow anything just to get out of bed.

And one day, she'll go back to New York and she'll face up to Blair, do her best to ignore Nate, and never thank Chuck. Because that's not what they do. They just give each other what they can, when they can. No more, no less.

She doesn't recover. Not really.

Carter turns up on Thursday and teaches her to forget.

But that's a whole different story.

**xoxo**


End file.
